Attorneys representing four boys who say they were sexually abused by a Portland Boy Scout leader in 1970s, are suing the Texas-based Boy Scouts of America.

The lawsuits filed this morning in Multnomah County Circuit Court allege that Steven Terry Hill, now 62 and a convicted sex offender, moved from California to Portland in 1976 and became a Scoutmaster here, despite reports that Hill had sexually abused three boys in California.

Attorney Steve Crew of the Portland law firm O'Donnell Clark & Crew, said Tuesday's suits brings the total number of former Scouts who claim Hill sexually abused them to seven.

"While stories of sexual abuse in Scouting have become more and more common, what's striking about our seven clients is that they were all abused after the Boy Scouts had learned that their Scoutmaster was a pedophile," Crew said.

The lawsuits claim that Hill would frequently abuse more than one boy at a time, and encouraged them to have sex with each other. As time went on, the suits allege, the abuse became more extreme.

Four lawsuits were filed on behalf of the four new alleged victims, with each of the plaintiffs seeking $5.25 million, for a total of $21 million from Boy Scouts of America, and the Boy Scouts Cascade Pacific Council in Portland.The suits allege that the organization failed to protect their clients from Hill, who had been accused of sexually abusing boys as a Scoutmaster in California.

View full sizeStuart Tomlinson/The OregonianAttorneys, from left, Kelly Clark, Steve Crew and Peter Janci of the Portland law firm O'Donnell, Clark & Crew, at a news conference Tuesday. The attorney's filed lawsuits on behalf of four boy scouts who claim they were sexually abused by scoutmaster Steven Terry Hill in 1976. The suits name the Boy Scouts of America, and the Cascade Pacific Council as defendants, and seeks $5.25 million for each of the plaintiffs.

Deron Smith, a spokesman for the Boy Scouts of America headquarters in Texas, said his organization has made "significant enhancements in the more than 30 years since the alleged incidents occurred and continues to advance our efforts as even one incident of abuse, anywhere, is one too many."

Smith said all Boy Scout volunteers are given mandatory criminal background checks and must take youth protection training.

Scout leaders are also forbidden to be alone with member scouts, and any suspect abuse must be reported to law enforcement officials.

"BSA trains its members to recognize, resist and report potential abuse and also proactively shares youth protection information with Scouting parents, who are required to review the materials with their children as part of the registration process,'' Smith said.

Four former boy scouts sue national Boy Scouts of America, local chapter, for $21 millionA lawsuit filed in Multnomah County today alleges that for almost two years, scoutmaster Steven Terry Hill groomed and then sexually abused boy scouts in Troop 76 in Southeast Portland. He was given this position by the local Cascade Council despite information from a scout troop executive in California, that he had been accused of abusing boys there. The suit seeks $5.25 million for each alleged victim, for a total of $21 million.

According to court records, Hill was convicted of four counts of first degree sodomy, three counts of second degree sex abuse, five counts of delivering controlled substances to a minor and three misdemeanor counts of furnishing alcohol to a minor in 1991, and served 20 years in prison. He was released in April.

“What is so shocking about this case is that none of the abuse these boys suffered had to happen – it could have all been easily avoided,” said Crew. “All the Boy Scouts had to do was exclude Hill from scouting, call the police, or even warn the boys about the danger Hill posed.”